Fred Maroun is a Canadian of Arab origin who lived in Lebanon until 1984, including during 10 years of civil war. Fred supports Israel's right to exist as a Jewish state, and he supports a liberal and democratic Middle East where all religions and nationalities, including Palestinians, can co-exist in peace with each other and with Israel. More blogs by Fred Maroun can be found at http://www.jpost.com/Blogger/Fred-Maroun and http://blogs.timesofisrael.com/author/fred-maroun/.

Saturday, June 20, 2015

I am not a partisan New Democrat
although I was a member of the NDP when I was much younger. More recently I have preferred the centrist
Liberals, and I was considering voting Conservative in the coming federal
election; however, under the leadership of Tom Mulcair, I think that the NDP
offers the best choice for Canadians, especially if one happens to be an
immigrant from the Middle East. Here are
ten reasons:

1. Support for Palestinians. Like the two
other major parties, the NDP supports a two-state solution for Israel and
Palestine. In addition, the NDP specifically opposes “Israeli occupation of Palestinian land”. Tom Mulcair responded sympathetically to the Palestinian request for statehood status at
the UN in 2012 while Prime Minister Stephen Harper vehemently opposed it.

2. Support for Israel. Mulcair
supports Israel’s right to exist and defend itself, even when a political cost must be paid. He
has successfully sidelined a small but vocal anti-Israel element within his party. Harper is often cited as a strong ally of
Israel, but I have my doubts as I explained in the Times of Israel. I think that
the mature and dignified approach of Mulcair is more valuable to Israel and to
peace.

3. Balanced on the Middle East. Mulcair’s response to
the war between Israel and Hamas in 2014 showed a deep concern for Palestinian
casualties but at the same time, he did not waver in his support for Israel’s
right to defend itself against terrorists.
Being pro-Palestinian and pro-Israel at the same time is a significant
challenge in a conflict that is very polarized, but Mulcair is in a better
position than either of the two other leaders to meet that challenge. Canada is not a major player in the Middle
East, but if we can ever help mediate between the two sides, Mulcair would be
more credible than Harper.

4. Cautious about military interventions. I have argued
in the past that the NDP erred in not supporting military action against Daesh (ISIS), but the NDP has
supported other military actions, such as the Canadian mission in Libya under a
UN mandate to protect civilians. The NDP
makes these decisions on a case-by-case basis, but it is clear that they are
less keen on military interventions than Harper who had supported the disastrous
U.S. intervention against Saddam Hussein in Iraq.

5. Bill C-51. Bill C-51 has been denounced by a long list
of legal experts who wrote that it “vastly expands the scope of covert state activity
when that activity will be subject to poor or even non-existent democratic
oversight or review”, and by the privacy commissioner of Canada who said that “measures in the bill to protect
against unreasonable loss of privacy are seriously deficient”. The NDP is the
only major party to oppose bill C-51.

6. Mulcair’s experience and capability. Those who do
not support Harper’s policies, particularly on the environment and on
scientific research, will look for an alternative, and Tom Mulcair, who has
experience in government and who is knowledgeable on many issues, is a more
credible choice than Justin Trudeau.
Trudeau has never been elected to any post, not even as a school board
trustee, before he was elected MP in 2008.
Since then, Trudeau has shown poor political judgement, making several gaffes
that embarrassed his party, including an inappropriate sexual joke during a debate about the very serious topic of Daesh.

7. Support for manufacturing sector and small businesses. Mulcair has
pledged to support Canada’s manufacturing industry and small businesses. These sectors
provide good jobs and business opportunities to new immigrants.

8. Support for minority rights. Mulcair took a
bold stand against the “charter of values” that was proposed by the Parti
Quebecois in 2013, despite the potential electoral cost to the NDP in
Quebec. He declared, “What
we have today is an attempt to impose state-mandated discrimination against
minorities in the Quebec civil service. That for us is an absolute non-starter.”

9. Strong social policies while fiscally conservative. The NDP is
notorious for its concern for the working class and the disadvantaged, but the
NDP also has had an excellent record of fiscal conservatism during its tenures in provincial governments. This dual approach helps new immigrants who
are struggling to find jobs and make ends meet.

10. Support for immigrants and refugees. New Democrats support
immigrants and refugees, not only in theory,
but also in practice. In the case of gay
Palestinian John Calvin who is seeking refugee status, I have personally contacted all three
parties, but three weeks later, only the NDP MPs have taken the time to
respond, ask questions, and try to help.

The Conservative government is
increasingly arrogant, secretive, and unimaginative. The Liberal party failed to rebuild itself
and is instead attempting to rely on a glamourous name in order to seduce what
they believe is a naïve electorate. I do
not expect miracles from any government, but I believe that under the pragmatic
and experienced leadership of Tom Mulcair, now is finally the right time to
give the New Democrats a chance.

This article was also published in New Canadian Media at http://www.newcanadianmedia.ca/item/28449-10-reasons-to-vote-ndp-if-you-re-from-the-middle-east

Saturday, June 6, 2015

Israel
is accused by “pro-Palestinian”
activists of having little care for Palestinian
civilians, of dehumanizing them, but reality is quite different. Although there is extensive dehumanizing of
the Palestinians, the guilty party is not who you might think.

Israel
is accused of humiliating Palestinians at security checkpoints, and she is
accused of not taking enough care in attacks against Hamas to avoid civilian
casualties. Some even go as far as
accusing Israel of genocide against the Palestinians.

The
truth is quite different. Although
Palestinians do indeed experience humiliation in some cases at checkpoints, and
although there are too many civilian casualties during Israeli attacks on
terrorists (even one is too many), there is extensive evidence that Israel
applies standards of care that are at least as good as any Liberal democracy
would apply in similar circumstances. And
there is certainly no genocide.

The
dehumanizing of the Palestinians does indeed happen among overzealous
pro-Zionist activists. Some of these
activists, especially the ones who do not live in Israel, tend to think of
Palestinians in abstract terms. They use
arguments such as “there is no such thing as Palestinians”, and they insensitively
dismiss real Palestinian tragedies (such as the destruction caused by wars in
Gaza, or the dire situation of refugees in Arab countries) as unimportant since
Israel is legitimately defending itself.

The
dehumanizing of the Palestinians is also widespread
among Arab regimes. They used the Palestinians as pawns from the
moment Israel’s independence was declared, and they continue to do so today. The fact that Arab regimes do not offer
citizenship to the Palestinian refugees that they have hosted for decades is a
neglect that would be vilified in the strongest terms if it were taking place
in Europe or North America, but because the offenders are Arabs and the victims
are Arabs, the world ignores the crime and even encourages it by funding it
through a specially-formed UN agency (the UNRWA).

The
all-time champions in dehumanizing Palestinians, however, are the inappropriately
named “pro-Palestinian” activists. While
some Zionists unfairly ignore any deaths in Gaza, “pro-Palestinian” activists use
Palestinian deaths for propaganda purposes and in the same breath refuse to
demand an end to terrorist attacks from Gaza.
Yet stopping terrorist attacks from Gaza is the only way to prevent civilians
from being caught in the crossfire of retaliations by Israel. While some Zionists see the defense of Israel
as an objective that overrides any Palestinian interests, “pro-Palestinian”
activists see the destruction of Israel as an objective that can only be
achieved through
Palestinian deaths.

In
the West Bank too, “pro-Palestinian” activists use
Palestinians as pawns. They are engaged in a campaign to
de-legitimize Israeli businesses that operate in the West Bank regardless of
the fact that those businesses typically provide good employment opportunities
to Palestinians. “Pro-Palestinian”
activists see the loss of jobs by Palestinians as a reasonable price to pay for
the greater goal of weakening Israel.

The
“pro-Palestinian” activists have therefore entirely completed the switch from supposedly
being pro-Palestinian to being fully anti-Palestinian. While they claim to defend the interests of
Palestinians, they in fact thrive on the deaths and unemployment of
Palestinians.

Palestinians
are real. They are not abstractions, and
each Palestinian life matters. John
Calvin is a Palestinian refugee in Canada who
is in danger of being deported back to the Palestinian territories where his
life would be at risk due to his homosexuality, his conversion to Christianity,
and his support for Israel. We have yet
to see a single “pro-Palestinian” group come to the defense of Calvin. There is no doubt that if Calvin was a supporter
of Hamas and in danger of being jailed by Israel, “pro-Palestinian” groups
would have sprung to his defense, but because he supports Israel, they do not
see him as a Palestinian worth defending.
It is not Palestinian lives that “pro-Palestinian” activists value; it
is the propaganda value of Palestinian lives and deaths that they value.

Of
course for anti-Zionists, it all starts with dehumanizing Israelis. If they realized that Israelis are real
people, they would be more likely to realize that Palestinians too are real
people. Anti-Zionists, however, see
Israelis as an abstract imperialist blob.
Besides the fact that Israel is not an imperialist enterprise but a
native enterprise, no two Israelis are exactly the same, but to anti-Zionists,
all Israelis must be denounced, boycotted, isolated, and ultimately made to
disappear.

Is
it important that the IDF see Palestinians as people? Yes of course it is, but the IDF is reminded
of this fact 24 hours a day, every day of the year, by hordes of people, even
Israelis themselves, but in reality the IDF does a decent job of it and does
not need to be reminded so often. Those
hordes of people do not however look in the mirror and see that they, more than
anyone else, routinely and thoughtlessly dehumanize Palestinians.

Whenever
they are told that their actions hurt the Palestinians far more than they hurt
Israel, “pro-Palestinian” activists plug their ears and start shouting “la la
la la, I can’t hear you, I can’t hear you”, then they go back to their mantra
about the Israelis having stolen land and needing to be punished and being
all-around evil people and so on. It
would be funny if it were not real.

It
is appalling but somewhat expected (given over 67 years of violence against
Israel) that some Zionists would dehumanize Palestinians, but it is quite a
tragedy that “pro-Palestinian” activists are even worse offenders. The compulsive and fanatical nature of
anti-Zionism is the problem. It
prevents its adherents from seeing the trees while they obsess about a forest
that mostly exists in their imaginations.
The hateful nature of anti-Zionism burns everything around it, and the
Palestinians are its main victims.

We
therefore call for an awakening of conscience among the ranks of those who call
themselves pro-Palestinian. If they
truly are pro-Palestinian, and not simply anti-Israel, then we expect them to
strongly condemn Hamas terrorism and Fatah corruption which are the main causes
of Palestinian suffering, rather than demonize Israel while ignoring the
consequences of that demonization on the lives of real Palestinians.

About Me

Fred is a Canadian of Arab origin who supports Israel's right to exist as a Jewish state. He also supports a liberal and democratic Middle East where all religions and nationalities, including Palestine, can co-exist in peace with each other and with Israel, and where human rights are respected.